Carlos Williams,
you were
you were
wrong—not about
much, but about early
spring
and all
that reddish
purplish twiggy stuff—for
sure-
ly,
there's no
such stark dignity—
there is only
someone
like me
arriving here,
probably a little too early, and
yet,
so
so so
so so so very
lonely late—to see
these old
strands of icicle Christmas
lights, still clinging
pathetically
to so many wrought-
iron neighborhood
fences, long
since turned-
off and unplugged, forgotten,
and just left
here, dripping wet
with slow
thaw and suspended—as if found
guilty and hung,
for the sheer shameful
spectacle of the
scene—as the March sun
approaches,
and the tipsy
birds—begin hollering.